


the parentheses all clicking shut behind you

by inlovewithnight



Category: Bandom, Panic At The Disco
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-20
Updated: 2012-02-20
Packaged: 2017-10-31 11:33:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/343587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inlovewithnight/pseuds/inlovewithnight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dallon's getting divorced and doesn't know what to feel. Ian might be able to help with that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the parentheses all clicking shut behind you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FifteenDozenTimes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FifteenDozenTimes/gifts).



> The Australia tour herein is an imaginary one.
> 
> Title from Richard Siken, "Meanwhile."

There's something soothing about the boarding area of an airport. Almost hypnotic in a way. Dallon's been sitting in the same chair for an hour, facing the wide expanse of glass and watching absolutely nothing happen except the occasional little flurry of activity as a plane came or went. Not often, because it was raining in LA and everything was delayed. Just enough to keep him from falling asleep.

"Soon, my man," Brendon says, looking up from his laptop. "Australia soon."

Dallon shrugs. "It's not going anywhere. It'll be there when we get there."

"The apathy's starting to weird us all out, just so you know."

"Should I be turning cartwheels?" He's being an asshole, but it's hard not to be right now. They keep telling him they understand that. 

"Actual anger or sadness would be more relatable than the zombie impression with occasional fits of bitch."

"I'm not angry." He'd been angry for about thirty seconds, the gap between when Breezy said _I want a divorce_ and _You know I'm right_. He did know she was right. Therefore. Not angry anymore.

"Of course you're angry." Brendon rests his chin on the edge of the laptop screen and blinks at him. "Your wife left you."

"She didn't leave me. Technically I'm leaving her, right now." And when he comes back, his stuff will no longer be in the house, and he'll move into an apartment she'll find for him while he's gone. Because they don't love each other but they'll always care about each other, like adults, like people do when they realize that it isn't working anymore and that they've turned into strangers when they weren't looking. And of course there are the kids. They'll always be connected by the kids, their babies, his little ones.

His stomach hurts and Brendon's still staring at him. "We mutually decided to end our relationship." 

Sacred covenant. Sealed in the...fuck, he doesn't want to think about this. He wants to watch the rain and the guys with the flashlights. 

"I'm fine," he says, and puts his headphones on before Brendon can try to talk to him any more.

**

Spencer's his seatmate on the plane, which is good, because Spencer's dedication to avoiding someone else's emotional meltdowns was tempered with Ryan Ross, which is, like, a process as intense as the fires that forged the One Ring in Khazad-dum. Spencer will not make him talk about anything. Ever.

Airlines don't let you knock yourself out for the trans-Pacific flights anymore, in case you get a blood clot and it shoots up to your brain and kills you somewhere over the middle of nowhere and they're stuck with a corpse strapped into an aisle seat the rest of the way. That means Dallon gets to stare at the endless round of rom-coms on the video screens and feel every moment of his back and legs seizing up in pain. He is too tall for this entire experience, even in first class. He should've stayed home.

Maybe if he'd stayed home he could talk to Breezy and they could undo some of the--

It's too late for that.

He unbuckles his seatbelt and stands up, smacking his head against the edge of the overhead compartment. Spencer looks up from his Kindle and raises an eyebrow.

"Need to stretch my legs," Dallon mutters. "This sucks."

"Hm," Spencer says, and goes back to whatever he's reading. God bless Spencer and his refusal to engage. If Dallon were stuck next to Brendon and his eagerness to talk about feelings for this entire flight, Panic would arrive in Australia with their singer's severed head.

He walks up the aisle, nodding to Brendon and Zack where they're both huddled over an iPad, and Ian, who's curled up in his seat like a kitten or something, tapping away at his DS. 

Dallon stops next to Ian's seat and looks down at the screen. "Are you winning?"

"Not even close." The little guy on the screen goes up in a shower of blood. "Damn. I suck at this."

"Got plenty of time to practice."

"I'm about at my limit." Ian laughs a little and jerks his chin, flipping his curls back off his forehead. "You want to borrow it for a while?"

"I've got a book back at my seat." It's highly recommended and literary. He's stalled on page three.

Ian wrinkles his nose a little. "Books."

Dallon has to laugh; it's an old routine for them by now, put together over the tours they've done before this: Ian playing a lot dumber than he is, and Dallon teasing him about reaching his potential. "Yeah, I know. Gross."

"Totally gross. But okay. Leave the video games to those of us in the proletariat." He pokes Dallon in the side. "That's a five-dollar word. Proletariat."

"I'm impressed."

"So give me five dollars, Professor."

"I'll buy you a beer in Australia."

"Fostah's," Ian says, poking him again and putting on the thickest Crocodile Dundee accent he can muster. "That's Australian for beeah."

"Your accent sucks, man."

"I'll have plenty of time to practice. On the _ladies_. If you know what I mean." Ian helpfully points at his crotch before he picks his DS up again.

Dallon rolls his eyes and finishes his walk up to the end of the aisle, then back to his seat. Spencer glances up again, eyes narrowing as he looks at Dallon for a moment.

"What?" Dallon asks.

"You're smiling." Spencer's eyes go back to his Kindle. "Ian gets the gold star for the day."

"The what?"

"The making Dallon smile gold star. It's a contest."

"How come you're not trying to make me smile?"

"I'm not playing. It's just Brendon and Ian. And Eddie."

Eddie is Dallon's tech. He only wants Dallon smiling because he's convinced Dallon's rough on his guitars when he's in a bad mood. "What's the grand prize?"

"You would have to ask one of them. I'm not playing."

"Why not?"

Spencer sighs and looks at him again. "Because I respect your right to feel like shit, dude."

Dallon sits there for a moment, feeling the cramped pain settle back into his knees. "I appreciate that."

**

Feeling like shit gets a little old, pretty fast.

Dallon isn't stupid. He knows it's going to take time to get over this. He knows he's going to feel bad for, most likely, a pretty long time. He would miss Breezy and the kids on this trip anyway, even without the hollow, aching knowledge that nothing is going to be the same when he gets back. Even without the sharp, still-bleeding awareness that the reason none of it's going to be the same is that he failed at everything he ever learned as part of being a good man.

He knows, and even knowing all that, he still gets really, really tired of feeling it.

There's a bar in their hotel lobby in Adelaide, and none of the fans seem to have found it. He goes down there for a beer, because what's the harm in breaking one more rule when all the really important ones are shattered on the floor? Not that he's kept the Word of Wisdom since college anyway. He needs to stop letting himself think about this. He needs to stop letting himself think at all.

Fortunately the bar exists to help with that.

Ian's already at the bar when Dallon gets there, a knit cap pulled down over his curls. "Trying to be incognito?" Dallon asks, sitting down beside him and waving to the bartender. "I'll have what he's having."

Ian tugs the cap down a bit lower. "Fair warning, Professor, I'm drinking stuff made of tequila and mango juice."

"Never mind," Dallon says immediately. "I'll have a beer. Whatever your favorite is. Thanks."

"I am trying to be incognito," Ian says after a moment, swinging his feet in a lazy pattern against the legs of the barstool. "But really, if you think about it, the ones who would recognize the two of us in disguise are the ones we most need to be concerned about anyway."

"I'm not in disguise."

"You didn't shave today." Ian tips his glass, chasing pale drops of drink around the rim with his tongue. Tequila and mango juice. Dallon can't imagine the sickly sweetness. "That's sort of like a disguise."

"Not really." Dallon's beer arrives. "Wasn't I supposed to be buying you a beer, anyway? From the plane ride?"

Ian shrugs, his tongue still extended in pursuit of a drop. "No big deal."

"Well, if you want to order one, I'll pay for it."

"Cool." Ian sits up straighter and downs the rest of his drink in two swallows. "I was hoping you'd say that."

"You were?"

"Yeah. Drinking alone's boring, and you need cheering up."

"I'm fine."

"Sure. But you're not _good_." Ian waves to the bartender. "A beer for me, too, please, and just keep them coming. My friend here needs to start feeling good."

The bartender gives them a blank look and moves away to draw Ian's beer. Dallon sighs against the rim of his glass.

"I think you creeped him out a little there, buddy."

"He's fine." Ian literally dismisses the idea with a wave of his hand. Dallon has to smile, despite himself, which is something he catches himself doing more around Ian than he ever expected. Especially these days. "Soon you'll be fine, too. Better. You'll be _good_ , in the sense of feeling no pain. This is my mission for the night."

"Your mission is my happiness?"

"Your goodness, at least. Your virtue, if you will."

"I think I won't," Dallon says decisively.

Ian grins at him. "You might."

**

Dallon's virtue is, it turns out, a flighty and fickle thing, at least when it's been served Australian beer and aided and abetted by Ian Crawford.

There's a stretch of the evening he doesn't remember at all, not the next day or ever again, that starts in the bar and ends in Ian's room, with his hands on Ian's waist. His hands are broad enough almost to span across Ian's back and touch fingertips, his thumbs pressed to the hollow of Ian's hips.

Ian's kissing him at the point that his brain kicks back in, warm and open-mouthed and delighted, not holding anything back. His hands are bunched in Dallon's t-shirt, tugging at it, keeping Dallon in close where Ian can grind against his thigh.

Because Dallon's thigh is between Ian's legs, and Ian's riding it like a horny teenager, his jeans curved out at the zipper where his dick is full and hard and he's rubbing it against Dallon.

Oh.

Dallon gasps against Ian's mouth, the sudden moment of clarity and awareness like missing a step on stage, a moment where he thinks he might fall. "Ian--"

"Shh." Ian's fingers release Dallon's shirt immediately, his mouth giving up Dallon's own. He smooths Dallon's shirt down in quick, gentle strokes, like he's petting him, then slides his hands up Dallon's chest to curve over his shoulders. "It's okay. Don't worry."

"What are we doing?" Dallon half-whispers, the moment already past. His feet are under him again and he's moving upstage, following Ian's lead, gliding past where Brendon would be without missing a step or risking a cord.

"Wrong question, dude." Ian kisses him again, and it's easy to go with it, to sink into it. It feels good, and Dallon's so tired of feeling bad. "Ask me how it feels."

"How does it feel?"

"Fucking awesome." Another kiss, this one with Ian catching his tongue and sucking on it slow and lazy. Heat floods Dallon's whole body, pooling in his chest and his groin, and his hands tighten on Ian's hips again. He pulls Ian in, and Ian laughs, warm under his mouth, easy under his hands, and _fuck_ , Dallon is going to do this. He is.

Ian keeps the lead, keeps guiding him. He backs toward the bed, and Dallon follows, still half-picturing the stage in his mind, his own heart the drum he's following for the beat, his breath and his hands on Ian's body the embellishments he throws into the bassline. The metaphor's a little stupid. But he's drunk. He's sincerely fucked-up drunk, and the only thing that makes any _sense_ is letting Ian pull him down onto the bed on top of him.

They kiss for a long time like that, Dallon's body on Ian's, his weight pinning Ian down but Ian's hands holding him there. Ian's knees are bent at the edge of the mattress, cradling Dallon between his thighs, and Dallon's feet still touch the floor. It's awkward, a fact that only filters into his head slowly and hazily. It's awkward, and his mouth is red and swollen and chafed with the stubble around Ian's lips, and Dallon's dick is really, really hard.

He turns his head, burying his nose in the curls spilling out from under Ian's cap, just above his ear. He breathes in, and Ian laughs, his knees drawing up higher and tightening against Dallon's hips. "Dude, that tickles."

"Are we going to fuck?" Dallon asks.

Ian lies still for a minute, his fingers tightening on Dallon's forearms hard enough that Dallon makes a vague noise of protest. "Do you want to fuck?"

Dallon shifts against him, letting the crotch of his jeans press against Ian's own as he rolls his hips slowly. Ian gasps, a tight little noise drawn between clenched teeth. 

"Let me up," Ian says, releasing his arms and pushing a little at his chest. "Let me up. I've got some stuff in my bag."

Dallon doesn't move right away; that little gasp was the first hint of him having the upper hand at all tonight, and there's just enough animal in him not to want to let that go yet. He kisses Ian instead, initiating it and owning it, his teeth clicking sharply against Ian's and his tongue pressing deep. Ian tries to catch it again, suck on him again, and Dallon draws back, breaking the kiss and pressing a finger over Ian's lips to keep him quiet.

"Not a pity fuck," he says, proud in a distant way that he only sounds a little unsteady.

Ian shakes his head, then reaches up and takes Dallon's hand away from his mouth. "I want this too much for it to be pity."

"I didn't know."

"Of course you didn't. I'm not an asshole."

Dallon looks down at him, sweaty curls escaping that stupid cap that's still stubbornly hanging on, skin flushed and sweaty, eyes so fucking bright, and he doesn't know what to say. He should say _something_ , and it should be smart and profound, and it should probably include the words _we shouldn't do this, not now, not tonight, not like this_.

Ian moves out from under him more adroitly than makes any sense. "I've got stuff," he says again. "Lie down. On your back? I want to ride you."

There's a half-full bottle of beer sitting on the bedside table. Dallon doesn't remember which of them brought it up, but he drains the rest of it now, throat tight around the warm slide of it. Then he moves up the bed and arranges himself, head on the pillows, body stretched out the length of the mattress. He slips his jeans off, and his boxer-briefs, and then his t-shirt, too, because fuck it.

"Fuck it," he mutters, rubbing his hands over his eyes.

Ian's hands cover his, then turn them, fingers lacing together lightly and pulling until his face is uncovered and he might as well look up. Ian's smiling down at him, still bright and fierce and beautiful in a way that's so different from Breezy it has to be safe.

"Fuck me," he corrects, and kisses Dallon again.

**

Dallon has to follow Ian to the coffee kiosk, the bathroom, and the magazine stand before he manages to get him alone in the airport before they go home. "Hey. Can I talk to you for a minute?"

"Talk away, Professor." Ian frowns at the row of Australian gossip magazines. "I'm listening."

"When we get back."

Ian's mouth tightens into a thin line, then eases again. "Don't worry about it."

"You don't know what I'm going to say."

"Oh, I bet I can guess." Ian glances at him with a small smile. "Tour flings, man. It's cool."

Dallon shakes his head and leans in closer to him. "That's actually not what I was going to say."

Surprising Ian always makes his whole face light up. He kind of looks like a cartoon character that way. "Really."

"I mean, I'm not...looking for anything serious. I don't want to rebound all over you or anything."

"Sure. I mean, right. Of course."

"But I'd like to keep...seeing you. You know. Like we have been." An hour in a hotel room here, a few minutes fumbling around in the dressing room there. Only back in LA there will be more beds and fewer dressing rooms. A major improvement. "If you want to."

Ian's brow furrows, but his smile's getting wider. "Can you promise not to have some kind of sexuality crisis at me or anything? Keep that in the privacy of your boudoir, man."

"I got that out of my system in college." Only partially a lie. His Mission, college, an off-again spat with Breezy when he met that drummer. Basically the same thing. He's very good at compartmentalizing that shit, which is the important part. "You won't have to participate in any crises."

"Then I'm in." Ian moves like he's going to touch Dallon's hand, then punches him in the arm. "I'm definitely in."

**

(Six months later)

The divorce goes through on a Tuesday. Breezy sends Dallon a text when she hears from her lawyer, which is a good forty-five minutes before Dallon hears from his. _All done_ , she texts when he confirms that he's heard from his side, too. 

He considers telling her that the temple divorce hasn't even begun yet, but there's no point having that conversation. That ache is his alone, and it's mostly died out by now, anyway, through a careful program of not thinking about it very much.

_Yeah_ , he sends back instead.

_Don't forget to pick Amelie up at swimming_ , he gets back almost right away. Divorced co-parenting: not as different from married parenting as he expected. Then again, they're not going about much of any of this the usual way.

He had moved into a dingy little apartment when he got back from Australia, one that probably could've been featured on a design show as an example of decor that exemplified depression. He'd barely been there a month when Breezy sent him a listing for a house for rent.

"It's two blocks from the house," she said when he called for an explanation. "The kids could walk from door to door."

Two blocks from where they'd lived as a family. Like living together again, only with two blocks in the middle. It made perfect sense, in a weird and heart-twisting way.

"I think it would be really good for the kids," she said. "The rent's higher than the apartment, but I'll give you back some of the spousal support for that."

"I'm pretty sure that's fraud or something, Breezy."

"Then we'll amend the agreement. Dallon." Her voice got all firm and sharp, the tone that always made him stand up a little straighter. "D, the kids hate visiting you in that place. They say it's making you sad."

"It's not making me sad."

"Well, it's making _them_ sad, and isn't that enough?"

Of course it was. 

So he packed up and moved again, into the little house two blocks away. And yeah, it was better. He's caught himself almost feeling human again, five months down the line. 

"Dallon?" Brendon asks, and he looks up sharply, jerking back into the moment as he slides his phone back into his pocket.

"Yeah. Sorry."

"No problem." Brendon's casual with him, a little exaggeratedly so. Studied casualness. He asked about the temple petition once. Dallon had been waiting for him to, so he could check it off a mental list. Brendon's the only one who _will_ ask. Spencer doesn't care, and Ian doesn't know.

"Let's take it from the top," Dallon says, more loudly than he means to. Ian's off in the corner, riffing on his guitar, fingers dancing over the strings while he stares up at where the wall paneling meets the ceiling.

"We haven't decided which song to work on yet," Brendon says kindly. Dallon forces his eyes away from the back of Ian's neck, where his shirt collar's puckered and baring a little arc of freckles.

"Right. Well. Let's do that, then." Dallon turns to face Spencer, who's twirling his drumsticks between his fingers like he'll wait patiently all day. Untrue. But he pretends well.

Ian rolls through another riff, and Brendon laughs out loud, shaking his head and moving back to the microphone. "Mr. Crawford is voting for 'Your Heart Is Weaponized,' I believe."

"That's not the riff," Dallon says. There's no way he was zoned out long enough for them to rewrite an entire song.

"It's a better riff," Ian says, veering back from his corner into the group. "Good job figuring out which one I was playing with, B-dog."

"Look at the two baby geniuses," Spencer intones flatly. "Aren't they special and precocious. Don't you just want to pinch their little cheeks."

"You want to pinch my something." Ian wiggles his ass at Spencer and then bows to Brendon, starting the quick roll of changed-up chords all over again. Brendon's brow furrows for a moment, and then he's got it, his own fingers starting to move, picking up what Ian lays down and handing it back to him.

Dallon closes his eyes and settles into the comforting heart of the rhythm line. He's not going to throw any changes of his own in today. He's a legally single man again. That's enough change for one day.

**

Ian's apartment is halfway between Brendon's house and the pool where Dallon needs to pick his daughter up in an hour and a half. It's a total coincidence, but a really fortunate one.

"Fuck," Ian gasps, pulling his face away from the pillow to moan the word. "Fuuuuuck. Dallon. Jesus fuck. Don't tease."

"Shh." Dallon kisses between Ian's shoulder blades, then the back of his neck, pressing his mouth to that arc of freckles that had distracted him earlier. Ian makes a thin, desperate noise, catching a fold of the pillowcase between his teeth as he clenches them. Dallon watches that--sharp white edge of teeth, damp blue twist of fabric, and thrusts harder, jerking his hips faster. Ian likes to be fucked hard. Dallon's never quite found his limit.

"Just like that," Ian gasps, letting go of the pillowcase and pushing back against Dallon, taking him deeper still. It's hard to keep a rhythm when he's being like this, half-begging and half-demanding. Dallon doesn't know if they're competing or collaborating, and he doesn't care. He just wants--he wants--

He thrusts deeper, his fingers sinking into the roll of Ian's belly over his hips, and comes, pressing his face to Ian's back, mingling sweat and spit and a few rough, stinging tears of exertion and salt in his eyes.

Ian's still rocking forward and back on his hands and knees, trying to get more sensation. He never jerks himself off-- _I like to wait_ , he told Dallon once, grinning like the Cheshire cat, somehow looking like the kid from Mad magazine and the dirtiest fucking thing under the sun both at once. _I want to wait until you decide to let me._ \--but he doesn't let Dallon forget about him, either. Rocking and moaning and if Dallon waits long enough, begging for real, turning in an Oscar-worthy performance of an insatiable nymphomaniac.

Dallon's never waited to see what comes after the begging. He's about half-sure it would be loud enough to make Ian's neighbors call the cops.

He pulls out, holding the base of the condom carefully and taking care of that before he flips Ian over onto his back. Ian throws his arms wide when Dallon does that, every time, like he's celebrating a victory while he stretches out arm muscles that have been holding up his weight for however long.

"God, you're so fucking big," he says, grinning. Dallon rolls his eyes, but grins back while he wraps his hand around Ian's cock. Ian watches that, his smile fading as his eyes get wider and his teeth catch his lower lip. Something about Dallon's hand on his dick just _gets_ to him. _You're hand is so fucking big, too,_ he said the one time Dallon teased him about it. _It's, like. Wow. One day you've gotta fist me, okay? Because I think maybe you would actually kill me, doing that._

They haven't done that. Dallon's not quite as into the idea of possible death-by-fringe-sex-act as Ian is.

Handjobs, though, he can do. Has done. He's given a lot of head in the last six months, proved himself a very quick and respectable learner, and he's fucked Ian in every position they can figure out, but Ian genuinely likes handjobs. He pervs on Dallon's hands, and he likes lying there on his back letting Dallon work him over. He likes the feel of his own come splattering over his stomach, and he likes watching Dallon lick it off him. There's no bad for him at all in the handjob experience. Dallon just likes seeing the way his eyes close, lashes fluttering against his cheeks and mouth going slack, when he comes.

Dallon lies down next to him when he finishes licking him clean, facedown against the sweat-damp pillow, catching his breath and swallowing the taste from his tongue. Ian turns on his side, pressed up against Dallon, his softened dick tucked in the hollow of Dallon's side and his hand running slow and careful up and down Dallon's back.

"Okay?" Ian asks after a moment, his fingers veering off to rub a little circle.

Dallon nods, turning his head enough to peer at Ian from one eye. "Yeah. Very okay."

"You want to cuddle and talk about feelings?"

"I'd love to, but I've got to pick up Amelie."

"Shit. Right. Swim-lesson day." Ian draws back and slides out of the bed, padding across the room to his closet. "I'll find you a towel. I'm out of soap, sorry, just use the shampoo, I guess. Hey, did you give her and Knox the sea lions?"

"Yeah. They love them. Thanks." Ian had road-tripped to San Diego with Shane on a quest for some taco truck. He came back with a shoebox of weapons-grade weed and stuffed animals for Dallon's kids. Somtimes Dallon really has no idea if Ian is the sweetest or strangest person he knows.

"What did they name them?"

"Amelie calls hers Toyota, and Knox's is Ben."

"Toyota and Ben. Sweet." Ian comes back to the bed and places a folded-up towel carefully over Dallon's head. "Go shower so you can pick her up, dude. I'm not going to be the guy responsible for some kind of child-endangerment thing. Or I guess it's abandonment, if you don't pick her up. Either way, I don't want it on me."

"I'm going." Dallon drags himself up onto his knees and rubs his face with the well-worn terrycloth. His stomach clenches a little bit when Ian jokes about this stuff, but only a little. Things have been going really well with the kids. They're adjusting, and he and Breezy haven't had a conflict over schedules even once.

It helps that Breezy's not seeing anybody, and that Dallon and Ian's thing is less _dating_ and more...whatever. Ian is definitely Dallon's whatever. He's never asked what he is to Ian. Probably a whatever, too. Or maybe a Wookie word for fuckbuddy.

When he gets out of the shower and dressed again, Ian's sitting on the couch, wearing sweatpants and a The Academy Is... t-shirt and frowning at his DVR screen. "I'm like three weeks behind on Dancing With The Stars, man. Sucks."

"Your celebrity girlfriend's going to feel so sad and neglected." Dallon stands behind the couch and rests his hands on Ian's shoulders, letting his chin settle in Ian's curls. "She's going to cry."

"Fuck you, dude, she's not my girlfriend." Ian cues up the first episode and tilts his head to squint up at Dallon with a grin. "Yet."

"I'm going to tell Brendon to write a stalker ballad about this. 'Run for your life, Nicole Anderson, another member of The Cab is on the prowl for you.'"

" _Dude_. Not cool. She and Singer _never dated_."

Dallon kisses him on the forehead and puts his hands up in surrender, heading for the door. "Enjoy your marathon. Try not to jerk off too much. I don't have the kids tomorrow night, so I'm planning to stay over."

"Three times, Weekes! If you're here all night, we are going for _three times_!"

"I'm so glad you have goals," Dallon calls back, and lets himself out.

**

It's not that Dallon's even trying to be discreet, really. He's never asked Ian to be discreet, either. It's just that...who would they tell? Why would they bother? It's none of Brendon and Spencer's business, and they've got other things on their minds anyway. Dallon doesn't really have other friends in LA. Ian does, and family in the form of Shane, but Dallon can't imagine any of them are especially interested in knowing who Ian is fucking around with at any given time.

He doesn't really think of it as _fucking around_ , if he's honest. He does his best not to think about it at all. Hopefully that's close enough to being the same thing as discreet.

It's not.

"So," Brendon says, smiling at him across the table at Starbucks at ten o'clock on a Wednesday morning when Dallon thought they were meeting to talk about songs. "My brother. My friend. How _are_ you?"

"I'm fine." Dallon watches him for a minute. The wide, earnest eyes, the smile that shows too many teeth, the shirt that Sarah obviously picked out because it covers reasonable amounts of his body. No, they are definitely not here to talk about music. Brendon has some kind of epically annoying plan. "What can I do for you?"

"Cutting to the chase. I like it. I do." Brendon swirls his coffee cup and takes a sip, his eyes staying fixed on Dallon's face. "So what's the deal with you and Ian?"

Dallon manages not to flinch through an exertion of will that should earn him some kind of a medal. "I don't know what you mean. We're cool."

"Sure you're cool. You're also hot and heavy, am I right?"

"Brendon..."

The smile goes off like he flipped a switch, and Brendon leans across the table toward him. "Dude, seriously, you were married for a really long time, and you have forgotten anything you ever knew about not acting like you're in a relationship with somebody. You are _bad at it_. Now spill your guts."

Dallon blinks a few times, digging his teeth into the tip of his tongue. Fuck. So much for discretion. "It's not a relationship."

"Don't be a pedantic asshole with me. You will never out-pedantic-asshole Spencer, and I've put up with him for a while now. Talk, Weekes. What's the deal with you and Ian?"

Dallon opens his mouth, then closes it, then tries again. "Well, I'm guessing by the fact that we're having this conversation at all that you know we're sleeping together."

"I do know that." Brendon sits back in his chair and takes another sip of coffee. "Since just after Australia, right?"

"In Australia."

"Dammit. I owe Zack ten bucks."

Dallon flinches, his hands curling into fists under the table. "Wow. You guys had bets. Nice to know you've all had a good laugh at my expense, I guess. Glad I could provide."

"Not at your expense, man." Brendon shakes his head. "And nobody was _laughing_. We just were keeping an eye on what was going on with you two. Because we care about both of you."

Dallon sits for a long moment, reminding himself to breathe, to unclench his fists, to relax. It's hard. Just managing to not get up and walk out of the stupid Starbucks is hard. "Thanks."

"So...what _is_ going on with you two? Is it a thing to make the Temple stuff to through more smoothly? Because yeah, that would grease the wheels with those fucks."

Dallon flinches, putting his hand up to make Brendon stop. "It's got nothing to do with...I wouldn't use Ian like that. It's not experimenting, either. It's not like that."

Brendon nods, putting his hand up in surrender. "Okay. Sorry. I didn't think so, but I wanted to be sure."

"You can be sure." It hurts that Brendon would think that of him, but not a lot. It _would_ grease the wheels. He can't fault the logic.

"What is it, then?"

Dallon stares past him, out the window at the street. It's cloudy, and the expensive cars of greater Los Angeles look flat and dull. "He doesn't hurt," Dallon says finally, watching a woman parallel-park her Mini Cooper. "Everything else hurts. I mean... _everything_ does. But Ian doesn't."

"Music hurts?" Brendon asks softly. "The band?"

Dallon cuts his eyes back to Brendon. "Well, yes. That was kind of what fucked things up with Breezy, was being gone all the time for music and the band. So. You know. Hard to separate the two."

Brendon winces a little. "Fair enough."

"It's fine. Everything's fine. It just...hurts. And being with him doesn't. It's comfort, I guess. That's all."

"That's all?"

Dallon rubs his eyes, pressing his thumbs hard against his temples for a moment. "I don't know what you're trying to get me to say, dude. Could you just spell it out?"

"I don't want to see you kidding yourself, D."

"I'm not. I'm not kidding myself about anything."

"Dallon." Brendon's voice is sharper, enough that Dallon meets his eyes, startled. "We are not from a culture that's okay with casual hooking up."

Dallon shrugs, folding his arms across his chest. "That's not the American culture I'm familiar with, but okay, if you say so."

"I'm not talking about American culture, and you know it. Don't be a dick." Brendon shakes his head. "We grow up being prepared to be sealed to someone for _eternity_. You can't just flip from that to casual hookups without it majorly fucking with your head."

There's a reason that this is conversational ground they don't ever, ever walk out into. "I thought you didn't believe in any of that. You made a pretty big deal about turning your back, as I recall."

"I did, and I don't. Believe it. But shit, dude, just because you let it all go doesn't mean it didn't get drilled into your head when you were a kid. The shit that gets in your head then never fucking lets go." He shakes his head and takes another drink. "Us and the lapsed Catholics. Fucked for life."

"Are we done here?"

"Sure. Whatever." Brendon stands up and tosses his cup into the trash can. "I'm just saying. You can tell yourself you're being casual all that you want. But you're going to wake up one morning and find out that you've been putting down roots, because you don't know how to do anything else. And I'm totally going to tell you I told you so."

**

Ian calls at ten o'clock that night, when Dallon's sitting in the living room with his guitar, picking through a couple of lines that stubbornly refuse to become anything. He's supposed to get something to Brendon in the next few days; it probably won't make the album, but the fact that Brendon asked at all is kind of a big deal. If only everything he was coming up with didn't suck.

"Hey," he says, rubbing at his eyes and setting the guitar aside. "What's up?"

"Lonely. Kinda horny." Ian laughs softly. "Wondering if you'd mind a booty call. I know you don't have the kids tonight."

Ian always knows the schedule. Dallon's kind of impressed by how flawless his ability is. "You're lonely and horny and think of me instead of porn. I'm flattered."

"You're more interactive than porn. Porn doesn't actually fuck me."

"I think the major problem with you is how you don't just come right out and say what you want, Crawford. You're so vague."

"Whatever." Ian's quiet for a beat, then speaks in a brighter voice. "Hey, I'm like five minutes from your house. I'll be right there."

"What?" Dallon stands up, knocking the guitar off the couch. "What do you mean?"

"Dude, I went out on a taco run. I'm bringing snacks to the hookup. I'm the best booty call ever. Go flick your porch lights or something, so I'm sure I have the right house."

"You don't have to come over here. I can come over to your place."

"I practically already _am_ here. Come on. Flick the lights."

Dallon walks to the front door like a zombie and flicks the lights. On, off. On, off.

"It's weird that I've never been to your house," Ian says. "I mean, I know it's close to your old place, and I'd been there--that time Breezy had the party, that was fucking awesome--oh, there it is, I see you. Thanks for the lights. Parking, and...yeah. I'm on my way with tacos and cock, prepare yourself."

Dallon stops flicking the lights and unlocks the deadbolt, concentrating on the metal under his fingertips instead of any of the thoughts racing through his brain. Bringing his...whatever into the house where his children live half the time. Fucking him on the sheets he'll hold them on if they have a nightmare. It feels weird. Bizarre. Like a thing he should not do.

Which is bullshit, because it doesn't _mean_ anything. The kids are with Breezy, safe and sound, and Ian will feel good. He always does. 

**

Ian's a blanket thief who sleeps wrapped up all the way to the tip of his nose. Dallon's tempted to resent him bitterly, except Breezy was the same way and waking up chilly is familiar.

He slips out of bed and heads to the kitchen, glancing at the clock over the stove--7:35; early but not obscenely so--before he turns the coffee maker on. Coffee and toast and a little guitar time before Ian wakes up. Peaceful, domestic kind of morning that should probably feel weird but at the moment just...doesn't.

Ian shuffles out of the bedroom while Dallon's picking his way through those same few halfhearted melodies that refuse to flesh out and turn into something real that he can put forward with the guys. 

"Major chords," Ian mumbles, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. "Major chords are your weak spot...'s there coffee?"

"You're just talking gibberish." Dallon puts the guitar down anyway, flexing his fingers. "And it's probably cold. Make fresh."

"I'll microwave it."

"That's disgusting."

"I don't care." Ian bangs around in the kitchen, and Dallon mentally traces his route from the pantry to the cereal cabinet to the one with plates and bowls to, finally, the one with mugs. "Jesus, why do you fucking hide things?"

"You could also try asking." Dallon rests his chin on the back of the couch and watches as Ian pours himself coffee, tastes it, makes a face, and shoves it in the microwave. "Sleep okay?"

"Yeah, it was good. I like your mattress, Professor. It's soft. It's like sleeping on a happy cloud."

"I know, right?" Dallon looks down at his notebook and fingers through the chords on his thigh. Ian's totally wrong about major chords being his weak spot. This song is just stupid, that's all. "You going to hang out for a while?"

"If that's cool." Ian comes over to the couch and flops down, burying his nose in his cup of coffee. "God. Caffeine. Best thing ever." He drinks, and Dallon picks up the remote, abandoning all pretense of working. "Dude, put on _Live with Kelly_. I love her."

"You're a very shallow man."

"Whatever, asshole, I've loved her since she was on _All My Children_. I love her for her talent and her mind." Ian stares at him over the rim of his mug, wide-eyed and, to all appearances, sincere. "Kelly Ripa starred in some of my earliest, most confusing erotic dreams."

"Confusing how?" Dallon reaches for his own coffee, stone-cold now. "You weren't aware of the theory of where things go?"

"No, dude, I had the theory. But I don't know. They were weird dreams. She spanked me with a biography of Lyndon Johnson. What's that about?"

Dallon didn't dare hazard a guess. "Nothing good, I'll tell you that much."

"Right? Shit." Ian drinks and looks around the room. "I can't believe I've never been in your house before."

"I haven't exactly been hosting parties."

"You're at my house, like, three times a week. We're dating. It's crazy that I haven't been over here."

Dallon misses the table with his coffee cup, and cold liquid spills out over his hand. "We're dating?"

Ian's eyes dart back to him. "I'm sorry, did you _miss_ that fact?"

"I didn't realize it was _dating_. We don't go on...dates."

Ian stares at him for a minute, then clears his throat and glances back to the screen. "You're sticking your dick in me more than three times a week, Professor. Where I come from, that qualifies as dating." Ian reaches over and grabs the remote. "So now that that's cleared up, I'm gonna find Kelly."

Dallon drinks his cold coffee and manages to stay quiet through two segments of Kelly, including commercial breaks. It's only when one of the Twilight dudes comes on for an interview that he cracks. "I just haven't had to use the word _dating_ in a really long time, you know?"

Ian shakes his head, flicking the volume up and down. "Hey, D, if you don't _want_ to call it dating, that's fine. I'm not, like. Going to hold a gun to your head until you say the word. I just want to hang out here sometimes because it's a hell of a lot nicer than my crappy apartment. Is that cool?"

Somehow the exact thing that had been feaking Dallon out the night before now looked like a totally reasonable compromise. He wished he could tell if Ian was an evil genius or not. "Of course. That's...great, actually. It'll be good to just be able to crash sometimes."

"While _I_ do the walk of shame, right?" Ian laughs, possibly at the idea of him having shame at all, then tosses the remote down and gets to his feet. "Now that that's settled, I'm going to take a shower. Because your shower is probably also nicer than my apartment." He stretches, stomach flexing in a way that's decidedly distracting. Probably on purpose. "Care to join me?"

Definitely an evil genius. No question.

**

Things go along smoothly for a few weeks. A month, even. A whole month of band practice and taking care of the kids and sex with Ian on a regular basis. Dallon isn't willing to go so far as to believe life doesn't suck, but it's major steps above where it could be. He just needs Brendon and his mother to both stop calling every two days to ask how he's doing and stick metaphorical meat thermometers into his feelings, and he'll be just dandy and also fine.

The phone rings ten minutes after Dallon soothes a fussy Knox to sleep, and his renewed wails are immediately joined by tears of frustration from Amelie, who can't possibly stay asleep when the baby's screaming his head off one thin wall away. Dallon balances Knox against his shoulder, rubbing his back helplessly and awkwardly one-handed while he picks up the phone. "Hello? God help you if this isn't important. It is one-thirty in the morning, and I've got kids in the house."

"Dallon? It's me."

The flash of rage is so strong it makes Dallon's knees buckle. "Ian? What the...what are you _doing_ calling me this late? I've got the kids tonight."

"I know. I know, dude. It's not...that kind of call." Ian coughs, and it hits Dallon, belatedly of course, that his voice doesn't sound at all like he's trying to put together a hookup. He sounds exhausted and kind of freaked out, and his voice is weirdly raspy. 

"Are you okay?" Dallon asks, shifting Knox higher against his shoulder. The baby's tears have subsided into hiccupy, unhappy noises. "What's wrong?"

"I'm all right. Mostly. Just...my building caught on fire?" That's confusion, now, that Dallon's hearing in his voice. Like what he's saying doesn't make any sense even to him, but he's going to roll with it. "Fucking...fire. Shit."

"But you're okay? Are you at the hospital?" He can't make a run to the hospital. Not with the kids. But he could call Brendon, maybe, or Spencer, though then again why hadn't Ian just called one of them if he knew Dallon had the babies, or--

"I'm okay. Shook up." Ian coughs again, and Dallon winces, imagining the feel of breathing a whole building's worth of smoke into his lungs. "My stuff's okay, I think. Smoke damage. Maybe water damage from, like, the fire hoses and whatever. But my guitars all should be okay."

"Who gives a shit about the guitars, Ian?" That's a stupid question and they both know it. "I'm glad you're okay."

"Thanks. Um." Ian coughs again and Dallon feels the protective helplessness that's been clouding his head all night double. He wants to take Ian a glass of water and rub his back as much as he wants to cradle Knox against his chest and sing lullabies until whatever's making him so unhappy fades away. "I really hate to bug you, dude, I know you've got the kids, but can I crash on your couch tonight?"

Oh. _Oh_.

Of course.

"Yeah," he says, fumbling the phone and catching it against Knox's shoulder, which makes him whine miserably all over again. "Yeah, definitely, you don't even have to ask. Come over. I'll make the couch up for you right now."

"Thanks. Thank you. And, like, all my clothes smell like smoke and shit, so I don't..."

"You can borrow some t-shirts, and I'll do a Target run tomorrow. You live in pajama pants and flip-flops anyway."

Ian laughs, and it's raw and gross-sounding but real. It lets the knot in Dallon's throat ease just a little bit. "You're the best, Professor."

"Just come over. I've got two fussy babies, no reason not to make it three."

"Do I get hugs and milk and cookies?"

Dallon closes his eyes and rocks his son gently against his shoulder, telling himself that suspicious warm feelings in his chest don't mean anything. "As many as you want."

**

Ian makes a trip to his apartment the next day and returns with his guitars and the clothes he thinks can be salvaged just by washing. Dallon takes over laundry duty and tries as hard as he can not to openly stare at the circus that is Ian playing with his kids.

Amelie seems to consider him a larger, more interactive stuffed animal. "Terasops," she says firmly, pulling at Ian's hand until he slides off the couch onto the floor.

"What now?" Ian asks, shooting Dallon an amused glance while she keeps pushing at him until he gets on his hands and knees.

"Triceratops," Dallon translates, stepping away from the washer to catch Knox. "Sorry, you're the novelty of the day."

"I am a triceratops, or I'm, like, hunting a triceratops?"

"Triceratopses are our friends." Knox holds his arms out and Dallon scoops him up, blowing a raspberry on top of his head and holding him against his hip. "She may try to ride you. You don't have to let her do that."

"It's cool." Ian crawls across the floor after Amelie, making a grunting noise. Amelie stops and glares at him.

"Terasops _roar_ ," she says.

"They do?" Ian gives her a skeptical look. "I don't think so."

"Uh-oh, buddy, Ian's arguing with your sister," Dallon whispers in Knox's ear. "He's going to regret that, isn't he?"

"It's a well-known fact that herbivores don't roar," Ian says, ducking his head as Amelie fists both hands in his curls. "Ow. I'm just saying, I think the noise I was making is more authentic and--"

Amelie yanks hard. "Terasops don't talk."

"You have an exciting future ahead of you as a dominatrix."

Dallon holds Knox tighter against him, forcing himself to breathe slowly until he can speak without laughing. "Ian. They pick up words, like... _really_ fast. And Amelie, what have we said about hair-pulling? Not nice."

Amelie lets go of Ian's hair reluctantly. "Sorry."

"It's okay." Ian sits back on his heels and runs his hands through his hair. If the gesture's meant to calm the curls, it's a hopeless cause. "Do you have any books about dinosaurs? We could read one together. That would be fun, right? And a little easier on my knees."

Amelie beams, her face breaking into the broad grin that taught Dallon what the phrase _heart-stopping_ meant. "I have lots of books! Come on!"

Ian follows her off to her room, laughing as he goes, and Dallon sits down on the couch, holding Knox against his chest until the baby squirms in protest. 

"What am I doing, buddy?" Dallon asks softly, setting Knox down so he can move. "What the hell am I _doing_?"

There isn't an answer, but the washing machine's thrumming, and Amelie's laughing, and Knox is chirping to himself as he crawls around the floor, and it's everything that Dallon knows as feeling like family. It can't feel that way. But it does.

There are no songs for this.

**

"So Ian's living with you now, eh?" Brendon stares at Dallon with wide-eyed intensity. This is definitely worse than the phone calls. This might even be worse than if his mother was the one staring at him. "Well."

"Well, what?"

"My boy has become a man. Dare I say, he has put down some roots."

Dallon shakes his head and turns away, shifting his bass in his arms. "Go away."

"You're putting your roots all over him, man. In his hair. Down his pants."

"I'm going to punch you in the face."

"Gentlemen," Spencer drawls from behind his kit. "You are both very loud, and I think you might want to stop this conversation before Ian comes back from the bathroom."

Dallon looks back and forth between them for a moment. "How much has Brendon told you?"

"I'm as innocent as a schoolgirl." Brendon hustles over to his piano, out of Dallon's reach. Fucker.

Spencer rolls his eyes and gives Dallon his very best world-weary, do-you-see-what-I-deal-with look. "I don't care, man."

Dallon has no idea how these two manage to make him feel like a naughty kid in the principal's office so often. "It's no big deal." 

"I totally believe you." Spencer's sarcasm really is an art form. "Let's not talk about it anymore, ever."

"Works for me." Dallon rubs his eyes and glances down at his bass. "Are we going to run any of my songs today?"

Spencer looks at Brendon, who clears his throat and plays a few chords. "Oh, yeah, about those...they're really good man. Like. They're awesome. Just not _quite_ what we had in mind for this. Maybe see if you've got a few more, right?"

No surprises there. "Yeah, totally."

"Maybe you and Ian could collaborate!" Brendon says brightly, just as Ian comes into the room. Dallon rolls his eyes and surrenders to the oncoming jackassery. It's better than the alternative.

**

Ian's landlord's insurance company pays for all of the tenants to stay in hotels until the building is cleaned and repaired. Ian pockets the money that's supposed to go to the hotel and keeps sleeping on Dallon's couch on the nights the kids are there and in Dallon's bed the nights they aren't.

Dallon agrees to this plan while Ian's arched beneath him, his head back and his throat bared with the marks of Dallon's mouth blooming on the skin. Dallon hasn't touched his dick yet because Ian's still _talking_ , and he doesn't get nice things until he shuts up and gives in, until he's actually feeling what Dallon's doing instead of spinning out plans.

"...and I can spend it on hookers and blow, or, you know, other stuff--fuck, Dallon, come _on_ , just fucking _touch_ me already, Jesus--but like, I th-think it makes more sense, right, we can fuck all the time and..."

Dallon grinds down against him, wanting to scream in frustration at the hot pressure in his dick. "God, stop talking." 

"Say yes, then."

"Yes, fine, okay, yes," Dallon says, a stream of words without a bit of thought behind them, and Ian laughs and flips them over, more easily than he should be able to. He kisses Dallon's chest and slides his way down smoothly, with a grin.

It doesn't really hit him until the next morning when he wakes up cold and sticky and replays the evening in his mind. He agreed to take on a roommate. He's a newly divorced guy experimenting with his sexuality and inviting the guy he's experimenting with to live with him. Maybe not inviting so much as agreeing to let it happen, while under extreme erectional distress. Still. He's kind of an embarrassing cliche.

Ian snuffles in his sleep and burrows down further into all of Dallon's blankets. His hair's flopping over his face, his chin's streaked with drool, and he's smiling in his sleep like he knows the best joke in the world. Dallon can't help but smile, too.

Waking up with Ian there, even waking up cold and uncertain, is a thousand times better than waking up in an empty house and sleepwalking through his day alone.

**

Breezy's friend Dani calls when Ian's been living at the house for three weeks, just enough for the routines to have stabilized. "Hello," Dallon answers, grabbing the back of Amelie's shirt to hold her still while Ian wipes peanut butter and jelly off her face. He's using one of Knox's t-shirts instead of a towel, but at least the kid will be clean. "Now is not such a great time, can I call you back?"

"No, actually."

"I'm up to my eyeballs in children, Dani, can I just--"

"Dallon, Breezy had an accident."

Dallon lets go of Amelie and sags forward, catching himself on the edge of the counter. "What?"

"She's okay! She's going to be okay. She fell."

Dallon rubs at his face, trying to catch his breath and not scream at her to maybe _lead_ with that part. He's vaguely aware of Ian scooping up Amelie and nudging Knox with his foot, escorting them both out of the room. "She's hurt, though, or you wouldn't be calling me? I mean. There's a reason she can't call me herself."

"She's in the hospital. In surgery. She broke her leg in two places." Dani sighs, a shaky sound that matches the pounding of Dallon's heart. "Thank God I was there, you know? She fell down the basement stairs. She could've been there for days."

"No. I would've...I mean, I'm supposed to bring the kids over tomorrow morning." He wouldn't leave Breezy lying on the fucking basement floor for days. Who the fuck do people think he is, what kind of...

"Can you keep them for a while? I don't know how long. She's going to be in the hospital for at least a few days, and then there's recovery time..."

"They're my _kids_ , Dani. It's not keeping them. It's, you know. Being their dad." He swallows hard, gripping the edge of the counter. "Tell her not to worry about anything. I'll come see her as soon as I can."

"Right, of course. I'm sorry, Dallon, it's just...it's crazy. I'm stressed."

"Don't worry about it. Just keep me updated. Please." He fumbles for the notepad and pen stuck to the refrigerator. "Can you give me the hospital info? I'll call her folks."

When he hangs up, Ian's leaning in the doorway. "I put them down for their naps," he says. "It's a little early, but fortunately they can't tell time."

"Thank you." Dallon tears the paper with his notes off the pad and folds it carefully, over and over again, as small as it will go.

"What's up?" Ian asks softly. "Something happen?"

"Breezy fell. Broke her leg. She's in surgery." It sounds calm and rational out loud. Not at all freaked the fuck out. "Not sure how long she'll be...you know, out of commission."

"Shit, dude. Is she okay? Do you need to go over there? I've got this, here. They'll be asleep for a while."

"No. No. There's nothing I can do over there. I'll just..." He waves his hands, vaguely encompassing the room, the house, his life. "Hang in."

"Are you sure?"

That question has gotten so much harder to answer since Australia. It's got so many layers now. He never knows what to say at all.

"Yeah. I'm...yeah, I'm sure. I'm fine. I'll see her tomorrow when she's out of surgery." He rubs his phone against his thigh. Ian's looking at him with sharp, intense eyes, and Dallon's pretty sure he's not saying what Ian wants to hear. "I should call her parents."

Ian exhales roughly and shakes his head. "God, you are so..."

"What?" Dallon grips the phone tighter. "I'm so what?"

Ian's fist bounces off the doorframe with a dull thud. "So fucking stubborn. God. I'm standing _right here_ , man."

"I don't know what you want me to say."

"Of course you don't." Ian shakes his head and steps back. "Make your calls, or whatever. I'll stay out of your way."

**

Breezy doesn't get to go home for a week. Dallon's on a constant run back and forth between his house, her house, and the hospital. She doesn't want the kids to see her in the hospital bed, so he leaves them with her parents at their hotel when he goes to check in with her. He doesn't want to leave Ian in charge of them. It's too much to ask. Thank God they were about to wrap rehearsals up for a while anyway so Brendon and Sarah can go on vacation and Spencer can hibernate in a cave or whatever it is he does. He could never survive this if there was band stuff involved, too.

Ian doesn't say anything about it, but Dallon's pretty sure he's still pissed about whatever Dallon didn't say or do that night after Dani called. He keeps catching Ian giving him these looks, ones that he can't read, but he can tell aren't at all happy. There's something he's doing wrong, some way he's letting Ian down. 

The only thing he can think of is that they're not having much sex all of a sudden, but come _on_ , when is he supposed to fit sex into a schedule of driving all over LA?

The only thing he has less energy for than sex is fighting, though, so he doesn't say anything. Neither does Ian. He's asleep on the couch every morning when Dallon gets up, he makes peanut butter and raspberry jelly sandwiches for the kids, he plays dinosaurs with Amelie and watches weird, trippy children's TV with Knox, and he never says anything to Dallon that even slightly qualifies as a complaint.

He just _looks_. Dallon doesn't know what to do with that.

Dallon gets home one night with the kids just barely past their bedtime, so close that it shouldn't make much difference, but they're unbelievably whiny all the same. He hears Ian moving around in the kitchen when they come in, but doesn't stop to say hello, just force-marches them up the stairs and puts them both to bed. They'll do baths in the morning. And possibly tranquilizers of some sort.

When he comes back downstairs, Ian's sitting on the couch with a bag of popcorn, fast-forwarding through commercials. "Dancing With The Stars?" Dallon asks, rubbing his eyes. The popcorn smell is making his stomach twist in the way that means he's so hungry he's not, anymore.

"Nah, that's over." Ian hits play and drops the remote, holding the bag out to him. "Vampire Diaries."

"You have amazing taste in television."

"Don't knock it til you've tried it." Dallon takes a handful of popcorn, trying to catch Ian's eye, but his gaze is stubbornly fixed on the screen. "Ian Somerholder will someday be hailed as an acting genius of our time."

"Okay." Eating the popcorn is marginally better than smelling it. His stomach starts to remember what it's for, at least. "How was your day?"

"Fine. The usual." Ian shrugs. "How's Breezy?"

"We moved her back into the house today. She's going to be stuck in bed for a while, but she's really glad to be home."

"I bet. Hospitals suck." Ian glances up at him, finally, and something loosens in Dallon's chest. "Come on and sit down already."

Dallon sits beside him, eating the last of the popcorn and then reaching over to take the bag. "Which one is a vampire?"

"A bunch of them. It's complicated." Ian settles back against the cushions, the line of his shoulders easing a little. Dallon hadn't realized quite how tense Ian looked until it eases. "Man, last week's episode, I was all into it and then all of a sudden they used a Cab song. It's totally impossible to jerk off to Nina Dobrev with Singer coming at me like that."

"You shouldn't be jerking off to Nina Dobrev on my couch anyway."

"No?" Ian tilts his head to look at him, his eyes wide and direct and that look on his face again. "Why not?"

Dallon shrugs, the popcorn bag crumpling in his hand. "My kids are asleep upstairs?"

The look gets sharper, a more intense version of itself, and then Ian looks away. "That's it?"

"I don't know what else you want me to say."

Ian laughs softly and shakes his head, grabbing the remote again. "I don't know, maybe that I should be saving it for you?"

"Ian..."

"I know. I know. We're not...we're just messing around. I know that. Forget it. Sorry." He pokes at the buttons on the remote blindly, running the episode back a few minutes. The pretty dark-haired girl's blood rushes back into her. "Sorry."

"Do you want to talk about it?" The idea makes his stomach twist with dread. They established in Australia that they weren't going to talk about it. If he has to start now it's going to be like learning language all over again.

"You're tired." Ian hits the buttons again and the dark-haired girl starts to bleed again. "Forget it."

"Hey." Dallon touches Ian's shoulder lightly, carefully, rubbing at the spot where his guitar strap crosses when he plays. It doesn't leave a visible callous, but Dallon knows where it falls, can see it in how Ian holds himself. "Dude. You know I..."

Ian looks at him, and Dallon's voice dies away, because he does know the emotions written on Ian's face now. He's very familiar. Frustration laced with tired amusement, held together with affection that's just a little frayed at the seams.

"Yeah," Ian says softly. "I do know." 

"I'm trying." Maybe that's the right thing to say, the thing Ian's been looking for. Maybe it's not.

It makes him smile, anyway, and hit pause on the remote again, and lean in to kiss Dallon softly. "I know you are."

**

Breezy doesn't call him for help often. He knows she's making a particular point of that, because she told him, flat-out, by apologizing for how much she _has_ been asking of him when he brings the kids over to visit her.

"I'm happy to help," he tells her, grabbing Knox before he can fall off the edge of the bed. "You'd do the same for me."

"I don't want to be a burden on you." Amelie's asleep with her head on Breezy's chest, Breezy's hand feathering her hair. Watching them makes Dallon's chest ache, but not as badly as he remembers. Time apparently does have all the healing powers it's credited with. Who knew.

"You're not," he says, blinking hard to chase away the introspection. "You broke your leg. It's not like you're calling me over to give you manicures."

"Damn. I'll have to change my plan." She grins at him, he grins back, and for a minute he gets a glimpse of what this is going to feel like for a long time, for the future. He thinks maybe it'll be okay. Maybe it'll even be good.

Then it's time for her pain meds, and he has to gather up the kids and take them back to his place without them fighting or biting or crying or dropping things. Being a single parent really fucking sucks. He's going to write a letter to somebody important about making sure services for single parents get funded like _crazy_. He is going to be a warrior for the social safety net. As soon as he gets Knox to stop pulling his sister's hair.

Having Ian in the house is more of a godsend than he'd thought it would be, just because it's an extra pair of hands to do things like fold laundry, remove plates from the table before they can get knocked off, and stop Amelie from running off the front porch into traffic. Ian is undoubtably the fun one between himself and Dallon, and the kids play him more than a little bit, but he's not a pushover. Dallon doesn't think he can say the words out loud, but he doesn't know how he would do this without him.

**

The phone rings when he's right out of the shower, still finger-combing water out of his hair and trying to remember if he has any clean shirts or if it's going to be a sniff-test morning. "Weekes," he answers, staring into his dresser drawer. He swears he used to have more t-shirts than this. 

"Dallon? It's me. I'm sorry to bug you."

"For the tenth time, it's not bugging me, Breezy." Oh. Ian's been wearing some of the t-shirts. They should go shopping with Ian's hoarded apartment money.

"We talked about this the other day. I don't want to--"

"Just tell me what you need, huh?"

She sighs, and he grabs the last t-shirt from the bottom of the drawer. It's yellowed and features a logo for a bar that he's pretty sure ended up being condemned. "I have a doctor's appointment this morning and the taxi didn't show up."

"Why are you calling taxis for your appointments?"

"So I'm not bothering you or my friends."

"Breezy." He groans and slams the drawer. "You are a very frustrating woman."

"I'll pay you for the gas."

"You will not." He can't pull the shirt over his head while he's talking on the phone, but he gets one arm into it, letting it flop down his side like a flag. "I'll be there in ten minutes."

"You can't get the kids ready in ten minutes."

"Let me handle that." Sudden unforeseen circumstances are exactly the kind of situation where someone might reverse decisions he made without really thinking them through anyway. Ian can watch the kids for an hour or two while he's at the hospital. They're not even awake yet, after all.

"Thanks, D," she says softly. "I really do appreciate it, and I _am_ sorry to--"

"If you apologize one more time, I am not driving through for coffee on the way there."

She laughs. "Mean."

"You know it. See you in ten." He hangs up and gets his shirt all the way on, then drags his hands through his hair again and starts searching for pants. Ian can watch the kids. It's no big deal. It definitely isn't any kind of a _step_.

**

Breezy is the second appointment of the day, and somehow the doctor is already running behind. Dallon sits in the waiting room, tapping his heels against the chair legs and wishing he'd brought a book, or that he had any interest in magazines about exercise, yachts, or extreme fishing. He's pretty sure he does not fit into this doctor's imaginary clientele. 

The doctor doesn't like whatever he sees when he looks at Breezy's leg, and it's off to another part of the hospital for X-rays. "You can go home, Dallon," Breezy tells him at least six times. "I'll call a cab when I'm done."

"I'm not leaving you here alone," he answers every time, finally tacking on, "and if you tell me to go home again, I'm going to let them both have Red Bull before I bring them over next time."

"That would violate the Geneva Convention," she says, but she stops telling him to go.

By the time the hospital is done with her, she's exhausted and in terrible pain. She doesn't complain, but her eyes are wet and her lips pressed in a tight line as he helps her into the car. When he goes over one of the speed bumps to get out of the parking lot, she whimpers and punches the window glass.

He can't just dump her out of the car in the driveway and hurry home when she's like that. He gets her to bed, gives her water and her pills, and sits with her until he's sure she's really asleep and not just faking it to get rid of him.

By the time he gets home, it's been six hours that Ian's been on kid-duty. Dallon's vision is swimming with anxiety when he opens the door.

"Ian?" he calls. "Knox? Amelie? I'm home."

"You're Dallon, right? Hi."

Dallon stops in the entryway and stares. There is a complete stranger sitting on his couch, holding one of Ian's guitars and with a notebook open on his knee. He's wearing an ugly plaid shirt and thick black glasses, and smiling slightly at Dallon like he expects a casual greeting and maybe a beer.

"Who the fuck are you and what are you doing in my house?"

The fucking smile drops off instantly, at least. "Calm down, man. I'm Mike. I'm a friend of Ian's."

"Where is Ian? And my kids?"

"He took them to get ice cream because they put their toys away without him having to ask, or something."

It should probably be better, that the kids aren't here in the house with someone he's never met. On the other hand, his kids are gone. He can't see them, can't know in his heart where they are and that they're okay. So maybe it's worse.

The guy shifts in his seat, awkward under Dallon's stare. "They're cute kids."

Dallon takes a step back, retreating toward the safety of the door, and that isn't right. This is his house. He should be the one who feels safe here, not this stranger on his couch who's looking at him like he's crazy.

The guy--Mike, Ian's friend, what the fuck--closes his notebook and reaches slowly for his guitar case. "So I'm going to go, I think."

Dallon nods stiffly, reaching back to open the door for him. "I think that would be best."

"Tell Ian I'll give him a call, okay?"

"Yeah. Definitely." To give Mike credit, he packs up quickly and doesn't try for any more small talk before he's out the door. Dallon closes it behind him and goes back to the bedroom, where he sits on the edge of the bed and presses his hands over his eyes.

He knows he's overreacting. His heart's pounding, his stomach's twisted, and he doesn't know what he's doing or what he's going to do. Nothing he's feeling makes any sense. Nothing fits with the script that he worked so goddamn hard to learn.

There's an easy way to fix this, is the thing. There's a big red button he can push that will blast everything back to where it makes sense. It's the right thing to do.

He just needs them to hurry up and get back so he can _do_ it.

He hears the key turn in the lock and little feet on the floor. "Yeah, I think you're right. That was your dad's car! Can you find him? Tell him we brought him some ice cream." Ian's voice is bright and loud, full of laughter. Dallon swallows hard and stands up, smoothing his t-shirt out before he walks back into the living room.

Knox and Amelie throw themselves at him, chattering happily. He scoops them up and holds them right, breathing them in. They're what matters. This is what matters. He should never, ever have put feeling good or feeling _anything_ ahead of them.

"Did Mike leave?" Ian asks, poking his head out of the kitchen. "I told him to stick around and we'd do some more work when I got back."

Dallon sets the kids down, and they run off to their rooms, possibly the only time in the history of the world kids have cooperated with the need for an intense adult conversation. Proof from God that he's on the right path, maybe. "Work on what?"

"Eh. Side-project shit. You know." Ian shrugs easily and walks out of the kitchen, holding a tub of ice cream out to Dallon with a spoon sticking up. "How's Breezy?"

"She needs antibiotics. One of the surgical sites is...who the hell is Mike?"

Ian stops, still holding the ice cream, his eyebrows darting up. "A friend I'm writing with?"

"You just bring some random guy into my house?"

Ian shakes his head. "He's not random; he's a friend. Mike Carden? He was in The Academy. I swear you've met him."

"No, Ian. I haven't."

"Well, you've heard me talk about him, anyway." Ian frowns and sets the ice cream down on the floor. "Are you jealous?"

Dallon stares at him, hoping like hell he heard that wrong. "No, Ian. I'm not fucking jealous. I'm kind of fucking furious."

"Right. Of course. My mistake. Being jealous would imply that you give a shit."

"What?" Dallon drags his hand through his hair. "Have I suddenly wandered into some kind of a fucking comedy?"

"Yeah," Ian says sharply. "Obviously this is hilarious. Everybody's laughing."

"You brought a stranger into my house with my _kids_ , Ian."

"He's not a stranger! I know him!"

"They're _my kids_. You can't just..." 

"Jesus Christ." Ian throws his hands in the air. "All this time I thought maybe you fucking trusted me. But no, I'm just the dumbass you're letting crash on your couch and fooling around in secret."

"This doesn't have anything to do with trust."

"You're right. You know what? You're right." Ian grabs his jacket from the rack and heads for the door. "It has to do with you being some kind of fucking robot zombie who doesn't see what's right in front of his face and me being a fucking idiot who thought being patient would pay off."

The door slams shut behind him before Dallon can think of anything to say. He sinks down on the couch, staring up at the ceiling. He wonders how much of that Knox and Amelie heard. He wonders if it made any more sense to them than it does to him.

**

The problem with not thinking about important shit for a really long time is that when you end up without a choice but to look at it, you practically need to draw a flowchart and a map to figure it all out.

**

Ian comes back just after Dallon puts the kids to bed. That's definitely on purpose. Part of the flowcharting process was realizing that maybe it meant something that Ian learned Amelie and Knox's schedules by heart and never missed a beat. 

They stand in the living room looking at each other, Ian's hands shoved in his jacket pockets and Dallon's hovering awkwardly at his sides until he finally gives up and folds his arms across his chest. "Hey."

"Hi." Ian rocks back on his heels. "So. About...all that."

"I'm sorry I've been such a jerk."

"Forget it."

"No, I--"

"It was my fault, Dallon. You told me what the situation was. You were clear. I let myself get carried away. Forget it."

"No. Ian, just...just listen to me, okay?"

Ian shakes his head. "There's nothing to talk about, okay? We shouldn't have done...this. Any of this. We weren't ready. Or, like. It didn't mean the things I thought it meant. We thought it meant different things. Shit." He exhales roughly. "I had this whole really good speech planned out in the car."

"I've been kidding myself about a lot of shit, but I know it wasn't a mistake that we did this."

"I'm going to go stay at Shane's."

Hearing that hits Dallon harder than he expected, like an elbow to the chest. He takes a breath and holds one hand out. "Please don't."

"Dude. You don't trust me. You don't...I'm not part of your life. I'm outside it."

"I didn't know you _wanted_ to be."

That stops Ian. He stares at Dallon for a minute, taking one hand out of his pocket to shove his hair back off his forehead. "What the hell do you think I've been _doing_ the past...fuck, how long has it even been? What exactly did you think was going on here?"

"I don't know." Dallon can feel his face heating, helplessly red. "I think I wasn't really paying attention."

"Oh my God." Ian shakes his head slowly, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. "Professor Weekes, you are the biggest idiot I've ever met."

"I know. Don't rub it in." Dallon takes a careful step toward him. "I really like you."

"I really like you, too. Even though you're an idiot."

Another step. "I'm...I think I'm putting down roots in you."

The smile breaks free, lighting up Ian's face. "I hope that means something kinky and not something gross."

Dallon laughs, closing the last bit of space between them. "It means I want you to stay, and I want to try to do better."

"Oh." Ian leans in and kisses him, soft and warm. "Then I'm totally putting roots in you, too."


End file.
